Social media – breaking the rules – me not spud!

Spud is nearly a teenager in age, often a toddler emotionally but in his late teens in his head.

We talk about social media, how to stay safe, the implications, the positives and the negatives.

This weekend I feel like I broke every rule around Internet and social media safety!

This weekend I went to a conference with @purdy2233. The conference was held by the amazing Open Nest. So much of the interactions before the conference was on Twitter. For weeks people talked about who was going, the speakers, meeting up and the social side of the conference. I tweeted many times about the conference, tweeted I was going and shared information.

I tweeted with others how much I was looking forward to meeting them, putting a face to their name and a voice to their tweets.

We arranged to meet a fellow tweeter in a hotel bar and @purdy2233 even went off on her own to find her!

During the conference we spoke to many who we had previously only known via the virtual word. It was amazing how quickly we were able to share personal information with someone who we felt we had known for years but in fact had only met in person 10 mins ago.

The adoption Twitter community feels very safe, secure, nurturing, supportive and full of people who just get it. Is this one reason why I felt it was ok to break all the rules? Did I think it was on to break all the rules because I am an adult?

Can you imagine what I would have said to Spud if he had –

Arranged to meet in a bar someone he had met online?

Shared personal information with someone he had only known in person for 10 minutes?

Listened to him when he said “it’s ok mum, I have been tweeting with them for ages ……”

Talked about people he knew via social media but didn’t know their real names?

Sat next to someone who has a Twitter name, uses 2 different alias and is still not sure what her name really is!

Told the Internet world where he was going to be all weekend, in a city he had not been to, meeting people he had not met before face to face …………

I love Twitter, the people on Twitter, the support, the community feel, the advice, the expertise, the understanding, the acceptance but on reflection, I do feel it so easily takes your guard away.

I had the most amazing weekend, loved every minute of it, felt completely safe but it has given me the opportunity to see how easy it could all have been a different story and how vulnerable we all really are, especially our children in this virtual world of social media.